Suspended Animation
Cryonics and Suspended Animation. No longer just Science Fiction
Suspended animation or cryonics is a science that has in most peoples minds remained firmly in the realms of science fiction, apart that is from the work conducted by a few heavily mocked researchers based primarily in California. This state of affairs is probably due to some of the very entertaining and in some cases horrific science fiction novels and movies that have been produced. As a result of the often macabre portrayal of resurrected corpses committing murders and destroying souls, this potentially world changing set of technologies have been dubbed ‘pseudo science’ and the scientists who work in the areas thought of as cranks.
This is strange when one considers the potential of cryonically suspending and successfully reviving a human being. Imagine a world where no disease could ever threaten an individual’s life, nor could the debilitating and eventually fatal results of aging. If your body became damaged beyond repair, then you would simply have your body suspended and at a later date, when a cure for your disease is found, you would then be revived and continue with your life.
Admittedly being reanimated would be very traumatic if several decades had passed between your suspension and your revival. The world would have changed and you would have not. I’m sure though, that humans being the adaptable creatures that they are, they would soon get used to their new world and begin once again to contribute towards it.
Regardless though of the obvious benefits of funding research into cryonics, only a few reputable scientists have become involved in this young discipline (see below).
Current research into Cryonics
The scientists Mark B. Roth and Todd Nystul recently released some interesting results regarding experiments that they conducted in order to induce states of suspended animation in a variety of organisms.
A large number of organisms possess the ability to slow or even halt their cellular metabolic processes in order to achieve a state of hibernation or even suspended animation during periods of extreme conditions. Nematodes, Ground squirrels, various frogs and even the Salamander can naturally enter these states. For example extreme low or high temperatures or oxygen deprivation (anoxia) can induce such states.
Reduced levels of oxygen supply specifically, can be a major cause of cellular and tissue damage in donor organs and in the bodies of individuals that have suffered severe blood loss or blood flow obstruction. In the later case from such causal agents as strokes or myocardial infarction. In cases such as these restoring an adequate blood supply is not always easily possible and the cells and tissues suffer damage due to this low oxygen or hypoxic environment. It has been found through experimentation however that if you reduce oxygen levels even further, to a point where the oxygen levels reach anoxic levels (levels were oxygen is nearly completely removed from the tissues). Then this results in many organisms entering a state of hibernation or suspended animation. Basically this is a state were metabolic processes are slowed down drastically.
An example of a simple organism that can be induced to enter this state is the nematode caenorhabditis elegans. This worm, when exposed to anoxic conditions will enter a state of suspended animation and will then continue its life cycle when oxygen levels return to a normal or normoxic level.
More complex animals, such as mice have been induced to enter such a state of suspended animation artificially, by exposing them to an atmosphere that is up to 80 parts per million of Hydrogen Sulphide or H2S. This molecule is an oxygen mimetic and competes with oxygen to bind with Cytochrome C, a respiratory enzyme that is important in regulating cellular metabolism. When the mice were exposed to such an environment there metabolism was found to slow down drastically, together with their body temperature and their rate of breaching slowed down from 120 to as low as 10 breaths per minute. The mice were left in this environment for six hours before a normal atmosphere was restored. When it was restored the mice were tested to see if any damage had resulted to them. All tests showed that the animals were unaffected by this extreme environment.
This shows that inducing hibernation in an advanced mammal is possible. If it works for a mouse, then it is likely to work for a human.
Another experiment that was conducted on a group of dogs found that if you induce cardiac arrest and then replace their blood supply with a saline solution that is low in oxygen, you are then able to perform surgery on these animals, replace normal blood and revive them with a minimal level of cellular damage. It seems that tissue damage resulting from natural processes during surgery occurs at a lower level during these states of suspended animation. This situation has been accidentally mimicked in humans. For example a Norwegian backcountry skier had an accident that resulted in her spending over an hour under ice cold water. When she was found she was clinically dead. It took several hours of resuscitation to bring her back, but she is now well.
This shows that suspended animation results in a slowing down or retardation of tissue damage in humans also.
All of these experiments and observations seem to imply that there is a potential to develop techniques that will eventually allow humans to be induced to enter a state of hibernation or suspended animation. These techniques could result in a much better prognosis for patients undergoing extreme surgery and may even result in people with untreatable diseases eventually being placed into states of suspended animation until suitable treatments become available!
Mark S D'Arcy